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Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Pay to play
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So for all my talk about native plants, here's a nonnative that I like more every year: Deutzia gracilis 'Nikko.' One of mine, shown here, is almost three years old and it's finally looking like the gracious spreader it is.

It's a low-growing shrub that likes full sun but will deal with light shade, blooms en masse in spring - now - and makes a terrific border plant, groundcover or - get this - container plant. Now that's something I'd like to see. I put a lot of annuals in my containers, but I also have new clematis and heirloom climbing roses in several. No reason deutzia couldn't be in there. Even after it stops blooming, it's a pretty green plant.

It was shy for two years. Now it's spreading out and mounding up - nice and round.

It's a bit of a surprise to learn that deutzia is named for a lawyer! Johann van der Deutz of Amsterdam. Who woulda thunk it?! Deutz was one of three men who underwrote the botanical expedition that discovered this plant in Japan. Getting a plant named for you I suppose was the 18th century version of botanical pay-to-play.

 
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About Virginia A. Smith
Ginny Smith, a Philadelphia native, worked as a reporter at newspapers in New York, Connecticut and Ohio – with six short months at the end of the Bulletin tossed in – before returning to Philadelphia in 1985 to join the Inquirer. Her favorite beats here have included Center City, roving around Pennsylvania (and getting paid for it!) and alternative medicine. She’s also been City Editor and Pennsylvania Editor. Ginny has been happily writing – and learning - about gardening fulltime since 2006. She’s won two silver medals of achievement from the national Garden Writers Association and in 2011, Bartram’s Garden honored her with its Green Exemplar award for her stories about “the region’s deeply rooted horticultural history, cultural attractions and bountiful gardens.”
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